The Reef (Haifa) Surf Forecast and Surf Report

G’day, Rusty here. Look, I’ll be straight with you – this outlook for The Reef (Haifa) is a tough one. We’ve got a 16-day window ahead, and honestly, there’s not a single moment where the conditions come together for a proper surf. Every single entry in the forecast is marked as poor surf conditions, so we’re looking at a blank run from now, Tuesday the 21st of July, all the way through until Wednesday the 5th of August. That’s a long stretch of nothing.

The water’s sitting at 84°, which is a touch warmer than normal for this time of year – a couple of degrees above average, so it’s notable.

The first few days, from Tuesday the 21st through Friday the 24th, are just tiny. We’re talking swell heights of 1ft to 3ft with periods around 5 to 7 seconds – that’s weak, short-period windswell, with combined energy readings between 13 and 77 (weak). The wind is mostly cross-onshore or cross, so it’s choppy and messy. Not worth paddling out for.

Saturday the 25th shows a bit of a jump – swell height hits 5ft in the morning from the WNW, period stretches to 8 seconds, and the combined energy climbs to 322 (moderate). That’s the biggest swell of the whole run, but the wind is cross-onshore in the morning and onshore in the afternoon, and the wave comment still says poor surf. For a beginner-friendly beach-and-reef setup like The Reef, that’s just not clean.

From Sunday the 26th onward, it’s all small again – 1ft to 4ft, periods mostly 5 to 8 seconds, with combined energy dropping back to double digits and low triple digits. The wind stays cross-onshore or onshore, and it’s inconsistent. The Reef rarely breaks as it is, so this stretch is a real dud.

There’s a slight uptick around Saturday the 1st of August and Wednesday the 5th of August, with swell heights of 4ft and 4ft, and combined energy around 181 and 186 (moderate), but the wind’s still cross-onshore or onshore, and the period is short at 7 to 8 seconds. Not enough to make it good.

So, the bottom line: there’s no standout session here. No clean waves, no good wind, no real quality. The setup at The Reef (Haifa) – a beach-and-reef mix exposed to W swell – is best with an offshore from the ESE, but we never get that. The combined energy never reaches strong levels, and the swell direction is always WNW, not the optimum W. It’s a total washout. If you’re a kite surfer, the strong cross-onshore winds on the bigger days might be more interesting, but for a paddle surfer, this is a skip.

Rusty.

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